US president-elect Donald Trump on Tuesday announced that the world’s richest man, Elon Musk, would lead a new US government efficiency group tasked with cutting federal waste, as the Republican added a series of seasoned figures and hardliners to his incoming administration.
Musk became a key ally to Trump during his campaign, reportedly spending more than US$100 million to help the Republican win and repeatedly boosting Trump’s candidacy on X, the platform he owns.
Trump said Musk and another stalwart ally, businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, would lead a “department of government efficiency” (DOGE) a tongue-in-cheek reference to an Internet meme and cryptocurrency.
Photo: AFP
“Together, these two wonderful Americans will pave the way for my Administration to dismantle Government Bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure Federal Agencies,” Trump said in a statement.
The department “will provide advice and guidance from outside of Government,” a move that could allow Musk to avoid disclosing his financial holdings, he said.
In a post on X, Musk said the department’s actions would be published online “for maximum transparency” and would include a “leaderboard for most insanely dumb spending of your tax dollars.”
Photo: AFP
“This will be both extremely tragic and extremely entertaining,” Musk wrote.
Trump, 78, was set to make a triumphant return to Washington yesterday to meet US President Joe Biden in the Oval Office.
With just more than two months until he takes office, Trump is moving quickly to consolidate an extraordinary comeback.
Photo: AP
Governments worldwide are scrutinizing Trump’s picks for signs of how closely the incoming administration would stick to his promises of an isolationist foreign policy, harsh crackdowns on illegal immigration and persecution of people he perceives as enemies.
Late on Tuesday, Trump named military veteran and Fox News host Pete Hegseth as his incoming defense secretary.
“With Pete at the helm, America’s enemies are on notice — Our Military will be Great Again, and America will Never Back Down,” he said in a statement.
Meanwhile, Trump named US Congressman Mike Waltz, a former special forces officer, as his incoming national security adviser.
Waltz has hawkish views on China, but is not considered isolationist, despite desire in some Trump circles for the US to retreat from foreign engagements and cut obligations to allies like NATO.
Trump also announced he was choosing his former director of national intelligence John Ratcliffe to lead the CIA.
Another fervent pro-Israel figure, former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, was named as ambassador to Israel.
Rainfall is expected to become more widespread and persistent across central and southern Taiwan over the next few days, with the effects of the weather patterns becoming most prominent between last night and tomorrow, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Independent meteorologist Daniel Wu (吳德榮) said that based on the latest forecast models of the combination of a low-pressure system and southwesterly winds, rainfall and flooding are expected to continue in central and southern Taiwan from today to Sunday. The CWA also warned of flash floods, thunder and lightning, and strong gusts in these areas, as well as landslides and fallen
WAITING GAME: The US has so far only offered a ‘best rate tariff,’ which officials assume is about 15 percent, the same as Japan, a person familiar with the matter said Taiwan and the US have completed “technical consultations” regarding tariffs and a finalized rate is expected to be released soon, Executive Yuan spokeswoman Michelle Lee (李慧芝) told a news conference yesterday, as a 90-day pause on US President Donald Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs is set to expire today. The two countries have reached a “certain degree of consensus” on issues such as tariffs, nontariff trade barriers, trade facilitation, supply chain resilience and economic security, Lee said. They also discussed opportunities for cooperation, investment and procurement, she said. A joint statement is still being negotiated and would be released once the US government has made
SOUTH CHINA SEA? The Philippine president spoke of adding more classrooms and power plants, while skipping tensions with China over disputed areas Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr yesterday blasted “useless and crumbling” flood control projects in a state of the nation address that focused on domestic issues after a months-long feud with his vice president. Addressing a joint session of congress after days of rain that left at least 31 dead, Marcos repeated his recent warning that the nation faced a climate change-driven “new normal,” while pledging to investigate publicly funded projects that had failed. “Let’s not pretend, the people know that these projects can breed corruption. Kickbacks ... for the boys,” he said, citing houses that were “swept away” by the floods. “Someone has
‘CRUDE’: The potential countermeasure is in response to South Africa renaming Taiwan’s representative offices and the insistence that it move out of Pretoria Taiwan is considering banning exports of semiconductors to South Africa after the latter unilaterally downgraded and changed the names of Taiwan’s two representative offices, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday. On Monday last week, the South African Department of International Relations and Cooperation unilaterally released a statement saying that, as of April 1, the Taipei Liaison Offices in Pretoria and Cape Town had been renamed the “Taipei Commercial Office in Johannesburg” and the “Taipei Commercial Office in Cape Town.” Citing UN General Assembly Resolution 2758, it said that South Africa “recognizes the People’s Republic of China (PRC) as the sole
RSS